


Who'll Love Aladdin Sane?

by Cornuts360



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Aladdin Sane - Freeform, Coping mechanism, Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Inner torment, Piano, References to David Bowie, Song fic, Song: Aladdin Sane, Time War Angst (Doctor Who)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-30
Updated: 2019-08-30
Packaged: 2020-09-30 10:28:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20445647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cornuts360/pseuds/Cornuts360
Summary: The Doctor is having an Identity issue and self-confidence issues. He likes Clara, but he isn't sure if she likes him back. Was it because of his face? Was it because he looked old? He turns to the Piano for help.





	Who'll Love Aladdin Sane?

Clara was in the TARDIS bedroom when it all began. It was after a really tiring adventure with the Doctor that she went straight into her room to rest. 

Clara awoke to the sound of a piano, echoing throughout the TARDIS. She's sure she wasn't allowed to hear that unless the TARDIS was really desperate. She groaned in annoyance and took off from her bed. It was quite muffled at first until the TARDIS guided her towards the room where the piano was getting louder and louder. The door was cracked opened by a bit. She peered into the room to find it quite dimly lit, but enough for her to observe the room. It was like a huge studio, the walls lined with guitars and basses. The ground had many amplifiers and chords bunched on the floors. a drum set was placed at the corner of the room and a retro-styled microphone was suspended in the air. Where the microphone was suspended, underneath was a sleek black grand piano. Sitting at the piano, was the Doctor. 

His hands were dancing around the keys of the piano. The song transitioning from an unfamiliar song to a song that she could possibly recognize. 

\------------

His fingers were dancing around the white keys of the piano. Both of them. Elegant fingers on the black and white keys. After this certain adventure, it was enough to tire him. Emotionally and physically. 

He started slow until he began to sing, "Watching him dance away, swinging an old bouquet."  
His voice was quiet, and the tune was very jazzy. The first song that came to mind, Aladdin Sane.

"Sake and strange divine," he hums to the tune and continues, "you'll make it."  
It was strange, the Doctor being melancholy and so quiet. That was never him, no. Always the bombastic, unpredictable Doctor. Not the crisis hung, sad and tired Doctor. Sure he showed some tiredness, but not to the point where he has to have a coping mechanism.  
"Passionate bright young things, takes him away to war" The Time War, that wretched forever ongoing war. He may have saved Gallifrey, but it was the stress of finding it again was the problem. He kept a promise to his granddaughter Susan, that they would return home. To Gallifrey. But now he wasn't sure if he was able to fulfill that promise right after he left her in the 22nd Century.

"Sadden glissando strings." the piano was progressively getting louder, "you'll make it." 

"Who'll love Aladdin Sane?" Really, who would love him? Look at him, a two-thousand-year-old TimeLord, old enough to be a messiah. But he isn't that. Oh, how Bowie's words have affected him in ways that he didn't know it would. Who'll love an insane TimeLord? He loves Clara, but will she love him back? After everything that has happened between them and the Cyberman incident. "Battle cries and champagne just in time for sunrise. Who'll love Aladdin sane?"

The closest he got to an I Love You was during the Orient Express in space. He has cried when she wasn't looking. When she was in her flat, he wept at the fact that he could do so much better. No, it's not because of Clara's fault or anybody's fault. It was the way he felt after the Time War. It always comes back to the Time War. He was a war-torn man who has lost his family because of it. 

Did he really think that Clara would trust him? He trusted her a lot when he regenerated. Has that changed? Or was it still the same. Why is he only having these random thoughts floating in his head right now? 

"Motor sensational, Paris or maybe hell?" Was he a good man? A mantra that kept him going and going, spiraling him downwards in a loop of scared. His self-confidence was running out today, why? Was it this face? He has thought it would grow on him but, did it really? "Clutches of sad remains. Waits for Aladdin Sane you'll make it."

The piano was very much louder, the emotion was being put into the song and little did the Doctor know, he was shaking. "Who'll love Aladdin Sane?" he inhaled and choked a bit, his own tears beginning to well up, "Millions weep a fountain, just in case for sunrise." his words were shaky but he still pushed forward into the song, slamming his fingers onto the keys. "Who'll love Aladdin Sane?"

"Will love Aladdin Sane? Love Aladdin Sane..." the lyrics getting stuck on his throat as he sucked in a breath before exhaling letting tears flow down his face. He stopped singing and began doing the solo of the song. Shaking more than he was before, thinking about how he is no longer able to love someone. He wasn't able to show affection anymore. Why this face? A face so old and he really thought that he trusted Clara to show her his true self. An old tired TimeLord who just had enough of life.

His fingers smashing the keyboard in anger and sadness, working the insane solo of this song. Without even trying, tears ran down his face and his entire body trembling. The melody of the song, sounded as if he was going insane. He really was, it showcased his inner turmoil and the conflicts he had with himself. He truly is a madman with a box. Repeating the same chords as a mantra. 

He began singing once more but his voice was quite hushed it sounded like a whisper to himself asking, "Who'll love Aladdin Sane? Millions weep a fountain, just in case for sunrise. Who'll love Aladdin Sane?" 

"We'll love Aladdin Sane. We'll love a lad insane..." the insanity in the song came back, only to fade in a bit before just playing the highest notes on the piano and pressing down the lowest note for it to ring in the studio. He didn't finish the last bit of the song, he was so tired he just wanted to end it then and there. He never really liked endings and thats why he made it short. 

He carefully closed the piano and rested his head on the cover arms crossed to cover his face as well. He was sniffling and his back was rising and occasionally falling. Sobbing as loud as possible. The TimeLord was clearly a mess of emotions. Emotions that he has to finally let loose after a long time of bottling it with child-like wonders and interests.

\----------------

Clara’s eyes were wide. She didn’t realize that this Doctor felt so mad. In a way, she always thought he was mad, but this is worse. She sensed an inner turmoil with himself throughout the song and she always wondered what the Doctor was thinking. She didn’t know it would come out in song. She quietly stepped into the studio and sat beside the crying mess of a TimeLord. Clara places a hand on the Doctor’s back in reassurance. His breath hitched and his entire body flinched at the contact, startled and didn’t know that she was watching all along.

“Tell me, Doctor. What’s wrong?”

There was a silence that filled the gap and when the Doctor spoke, it was a whisper, “I’m sorry to wake you up.” 

Clara chuckled, “don’t be sorry at that. I just want to know what’s wrong, Doctor.” 

He looked up from his place to show her his eyes, it was red rimmed and glossy, and so sad, “Clara, I have so many questions running through my head I don’t even know where to start.” He tried to laugh, but it was too pathetic and it didn’t end as one too.

“Then we’ll go through it together.” Her hand that was once on his back, moved to his arm and gave it a reassuring squeeze. 

He told her everything, the TimeWar, keeping a promise, but there was more, “and...”

“And what, Doctor?” 

“It’s just this face” he sighed, they knew they’ve been over this, but why is this so different? They had this conversation before but, why is this one so different? “I hate the way it looks, even this body! I don’t even know how to show affection like a normal being. It’s like not knowing something and I-I just hate it!!” He buried his face in his hands.  
The girl in front of him took a hand of his and looked him in the eyes, “Doctor, why? You’ve passed your regeneration! Why now? Why?” 

“Because I love you Clara Oswald! Ever since I found out about you, how Missy was the one who lead me to you in the first place, so fascinated by your echoes until I finally met you and when I regenerated, I thought I trusted you and I really did! But no! You never liked this face. You never did! Because you expected someone younger instead you got this face of an old man.” He didn’t mean to startle Clara, he didn’t mean to yell. “I really thought you trusted me then and I thought there would be no difference right when I regenerated...” he hung his head low, no tears this time. He was already out of tears and it just came dry.

Clara didn’t know what to do, but without a second take, she took a hand and placed it on the Doctor’s cheek forcing him to look at her. Still red rimmed eyes but his face. It wasn’t traced with wrinkles that intimidated everyone, no. It was light, soft, very much not intimidating, younger even, and tired. And he wore a very suited sad look with it. 

“Doctor, that was all in the past. Don’t worry. Look how much I changed. I changed because of you. Yes, you may be a madman in a box, a lad insane. But you’re my madman in a box.” She leaned in and her lips were against his own. The Doctor raised his eyebrows in shock, until settling in and kissed her back. A kiss that lasted five second long.

“You have no idea how long I’ve always wanted to do that.” Clara said, smiling while the Doctor was in shock. 

Without thinking, he wrapped Clara in his arms and he pressed himself closer to her hugging tightly. “I love you, Clara. And I’m sorry.”

“And don’t you worry about it. I love you too, Doctor.”


End file.
